


he is the blade (and you're just paper)

by VolxdoSioda



Series: Whumptober 2018 (Complete) [10]
Category: Final Fantasy XV
Genre: Day 10 - Bruises, Gen, Prompto Whump, Whumptober, assassin!Ignis
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-12
Updated: 2018-10-12
Packaged: 2019-08-01 02:57:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,932
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16276511
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/VolxdoSioda/pseuds/VolxdoSioda
Summary: There's a ring of bruises around Prompto's wrists. Delicate, but deliberate.Those were not there when they entered Lestallum. It's time for Ignis to go hunting.





	he is the blade (and you're just paper)

**Author's Note:**

> More assassin!Ignis, because I've fallen into my own pit, and can't get up.

The thing about being an assassin in service to the throne of Lucis - you can always be surprised by something. Even if you've lived a thousand years, gone through a hundred kings and queens, raised fifty little lieges to adulthood, you can always be surprised by  _something._ Because there will always be something stalking your king, your queen, your little charge. It's a fact Ignis has hammered inside of himself like a stake, its facts as hard and true as ice. 

People hear 'assassin' and think 'killer'. And to some degree, that is the truth. But what they don't hear is 'eyes'. The Scientia are the eyes of the Lucis family, there to keep watch when no one else can or will. And in their vigil, they often see things others do not.

Like the delicate, but very  _deliberate_ line of bruises currently circling Prompto's wrists, bruises that were certainly not there before they arrived in Lestallum.

Here's another thing about being an assassin no one but the best will tell you - you can be surprised. But it depends on how you  _react_ to that surprise that depends on how the tide will flow. Ignis has had plenty of time to learn to react with Noctis' many little surprises over the years, and so it takes absolutely no time for the switch to flick in his head, for his civilian mindset to put the empty coffee cup in his hand down, step aside, and for his assassin mindset to pick it up and refill it. 

Gladiolus catches his gaze mid-word with Noctis. And while his outward demeanor gives no change, Ignis knows he's seen the predator lurking behind his eyes now. Ignis' gaze flickers to Prompto, and Gladio's follows. He sees the bruises. And he knows that from this point on, every move Ignis makes, every word he speaks will be in persuit of the hunt.

Because someone has hurt their sharpshooter, their baby brother in arms, their  _family._

And that is a crime punishable only by death, in the eyes of the blood flowing through Ignis' veins. You protect family. You guard your heart, hone your skills, mind your words, and you  _protect the family._

Gladiolus comes from a similar background, as does Noctis. Family is everything. 

And Ignis can admit when he first met the scruffball on the bed, he wasn't impressed. Neither he nor Gladio were, really. They weren't going to fault Noctis his friends, but Prompto just didn't seem to carry the steel needed to do what the Crownsguard position required. 

They'd both been wary about the idea, but Noctis had pestered his father until he's said yes, and Cor had taken him in hand and trained him, so there must have been  _something_ there.

He's never been prouder to have been so wrong. Prompto is still soft at heart - he still flinches, yelps and screams rather than remaining composed in battle. He still laughs and makes jokes and gets distracted by taking pictures. But never once has he run from a battle. Never once has he left Noctis' side, and never once has he failed in coming to their aid if they needed it, be it with gunfire, a distraction, or a helping hand on the shoulder as they limp away to find cover. He has proven himself half a dozen ways all by being himself, by holding true to his convictions and not allowing the danger to drive him off. 

So as far as the assassin in Ignis' head is concerned, someone has laid hands on their boy, and at this point that's about the same as someone laying hands on Noctis or Gladio, and  _that won't do._

"Prompto, care to lend me a hand with a bit of shopping?"  he asks, keeping his body language open and loose, as if he's just thought of something he needs. 

Out of all of them, Prompto's always ready to lend a hand - it makes this kind of distance-and-distract play easy to pull with him. 

Sure enough, he brightens, setting down his camera and standing. "Sure! Where to, boss?"

Ignis smiles indulgently. "Here and there. I'm afraid we'll be doing a bit of walking. You don't mind?" Eyebrows raised a bit, expression arranged to be accommodating not but expectant. Welcoming, but understanding if he decides to bow out.

"Nope! Lead on." His shoulders tuck small, a light fissure of tension hanging on them as his hands go behind his back. 

 _Tell,_ Ignis thinks, but nods and keeps the genial smile on his face as they leave the hotel. He picks a random direction and starts walking. Lestallum has markets in all corners, so if he decides to take the longest possible route between all of them, it's certainly no issue. Prompto won't say anything about it, not so long as Ignis keeps him distracted.

"I do hope you don't mind," Ignis says lightly as they walk. "But Noctis mentioned something to me the other night I thought it would do to touch base with you on. Have Gladiolus and I ever upset you?"

Those expressive shoulders twitch, up, and then forcibly settle down.  _Tell._

"No, no, you guys have been... you guys have been awesome. I'm honored you guys let me tag along."

Half truth, there, Ignis knows. Yes, he's flattered. But no, this trip hasn't been without its ups and downs. Ignis knows he's been curt occasionally, and he  _knows_ Gladio comes off as a bear half the time. But Prompto hasn't had the time Noctis has to distinguish  _curt_ from  _displeased_ and  _bear_ from  _pissed off._ He will, eventually, because none of them have any plans for him to leave the party, not unless it's in a casket, and not unless they're all being lowered into the same plot of soil Noctis is.

"You needn't be honored. Rather, it's the other way around in many aspects. You've been incredibly helpful on this march, Prompto. You should be proud of yourself. You've elevated the Crownsguard name, and helped Noctis keep his dignity when either I or Gladio could not." 

Prompto's head ducks, cheeks rushing pink. It's a fetching color on him, especially with those lovely freckles of his. His eyes dart around, never even getting close to Ignis. "Ah, me? I'm nothing special. I mean, you cook and keep us in good health and kick ass to boot. Gladio keeps us all safe, and he knows all the best foraging stuff, and he's never let us go cold or hungry. I'm... just the best friend. The comic relief, y'know?"

"No," Ignis says as they round the corner, and find the first market. Six blocks later. "I can't say I do. You're far more than that, Prompto, and you should take credit as such. Come now, chin up, there's a good lad."

Ignis pretends to browse, and peppers Prompto with a half dozen more questions, all the while watching his body language. He's wary, eyes moving even as his body dances to a tune only he's able to hear, twitching and swaying like he's ready to bolt. He's watching the alleyways and the corners, Ignis notices. Fast escapes - or perhaps blocking spots where he's been caught.

He buys a small pouch of salt, thanking the boy manning the stall for his time as he carefully leads Prompto away. "One down, so many more to go," he says, and the assassin in him smiles with far too many teeth when Prompto's right shoulder ticks up, and then down again. A signal of nerves, of prey feeling hunted, but not seeing the hunter.

_Tell._

They drift from one market to the next, seemingly at ease. Ignis discovers Prompto takes praise like he's been gifted something irrevocably precious, but also takes it like he's expecting the punchline to an especially cruel joke. Like he thinks Ignis is  _toying_ with him.

It would be surprising, the surge of rage that envelopes his mind, if he didn't know himself so well. Know what trips his triggers, what sets his teeth on edge. Prompto is one of  _them,_ but he doesn't seem to grasp that. He's holding himself apart, telling himself he's below all of them, when in fact he's easily on par. It brings another surprise to light.

Now that Ignis is digging, he's beginning to realize this rabbit hole goes far deeper than originally suspected. Much too deep for Ignis to deal with all at once. Even with Gladio's help, the damage he's finding, the clues he's parsing together with the body language and Prompto's words, will take months, if not  _years_ to undo. It is no longer just about the bruises on Prompto's wrists. He still wants blood for that, and will still  _have_ blood for that.

But it's now about fixing the damage done to Prompto. Damage that, if Ignis is seeing correctly, leads to abandonment and abuse. 

By the time they make it to the largest of Lestallum's markets, he's ready to pick up the largest sword in Gladio's arsenal and go to war. He doesn't, because logic tells him Gladio will gladly do it for him, and because they need an assassin still. But he wants to. 

And that's before he notices that Prompto has frozen up before they've even reached the first stall. 

Prompto's body has been talking all day, whispering secrets Prompto himself will never speak. Now his body  _screams,_ and Ignis listens to its howl, takes in the palid color of his face, the way blue eyes are locked onto something in the distance, and he traces the gaze across the air. Were it not for his training at seeing things others would not, he might have missed them.

But there. Five boys, all roughly Gladio's age, about his size, sitting at a table, hunched low like predators waiting for prey to stalk by. 

Watching  _Prompto._

 _At last,_ the assassin whispers,  _at last I have found you._

It feels like something uncoils in him, loosens and heaves in a great breath in preparation for what is to come. Prompto shakes and quivers, and does not move, neither forward or back. Ignis takes a moment to memorize them - the feel, the  _weight_ of their presence in the city against so many - and then when he knows he has them locked into memory enough to track them later, deliberately steps between them and Prompto, breaking line of sight. "We're all done, Prompto. Ready to head back?"

Prompto starts, his breath jerking ragged, his body still screaming, still quivering even as Ignis takes a shoulder in each hand. "Wh-what? Oh-oho yeah, l-let's go."

"Indeed." He spins Prompto around, puts one hand flat on his spine and all but frog marches him out. He feels the eyes of the men on him as he leaves, and he can tell they're trying to work him into the equation. He keeps his hand on Prompto's back all throughout the walk, the silence between them grim. 

And then, just before they get back to the hotel, Prompto stops and tugs at Ignis' sleeve. Takes a deep breath. "You..." And then stops, like he can't get the words to come out.

Ignis waits, patient as the sun setting behind them. "I?" he prompts, when nothing else comes out.

This is what he remembers of this particular hunt, these five kills. It's the memory of a boy who should stand so tall shrunken down on himself, shoulders tucked close as if to hide himself away, gripping the barest bit of sleeve with a hand that still quivers. It's the knowledge, cold and calculated running through Ignis' mind that one of his brothers has been  _harmed_ beyond anything that should have been allowed. That perhaps he went into this hunting for bruises, but he's come out of it with a long list of crimes someone will be paying for one day, when Ignis' knife finds their jugular. That he will bleed every last drop from them, will break them as they have done to Prompto, and he will be remorseless for it.

And remorseless he will remain, because this is too important not to care about.

"...Nevermind," Prompto breathes at last. "It's stupid. Just. Forget it?"

"As you say," Ignis agrees easily. "Come. I'll run you a bath. You're looking rather tired, my dear."

His cheeks pink at the pet name - and that's something else Gladio and Noctis will be made aware of before the night is through. Before he goes hunting. Because their little brother deserves the world, deserves everything they can give to each other in this madness, and Ignis is going to make damned sure he gets his dues.

Even if he thinks he doesn't deserve them.

 

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

 

He discreetly drops what he's learned in Gladio and Noctis' laps while he cooks dinner that evening, and talks of simple things as he watches the bathroom door from the corner of his eye. Prompto emerges after a long, too-hot bath, skin red and hot, but the demons behind his eyes mostly gone. Noctis and Gladio distract him with a last minute game of Kings, and then they all tuck in as if they're going to bed. Ignis joins them.

He curls around Prompto, listens to him breathe, feels the steady beat of his heart beneath skin, and then slips away when he finally falls asleep. Takes the black hoodie Noctis has left out - unmarked, no way to identify him - and his gear, and goes for a  _walk._

They're easy to find, his prey.

They never notice, in the quieter crowds of Lestallum's night, that there's a stranger in a hoodie following them from a distance. Nobody else notices him either, because that's what he's been trained for. To vanish, to disappear.

There are five of them, but as the men bounce from bar to bar over the course of the night, they never seem to notice when one of them vanishes here and there. And nobody else does either. There's no trail, no sign of anything having gone wrong. They're just there one moment, gone the next.

Just the way Ignis likes it.

The leader of the group, the one that was eyeing Prompto like he was a fish made to be gutted, Ignis saves for the very last. He tracks the man to a local establishment, a quiet little hole in the wall, where it's just him and the bartender and the man in the strange black hoodie. 

The man's first mistake is to say, "Ey, yanno that Nif punk I was tellin' yous about? He's back. Saw him in the market today with some fop - fucker's probably got plans for an invasion."

"Then deal with it," the bartender says, just to shut him up.

"Should. I saw -- I saw him go back to hotel with that guy. Should get me 'n my pals and burn the whole fuckin' place down. That'll teach 'em, yeah?"

That's the second mistake. 

The bartender rolls his eyes, mutters something Ignis can't quite catch, and disappears in the back room for a moment.

His third is when he turns to Ignis and hiccups, as though in surprise. "Hey, who the fuck're you? Who the fuck wears hoodies when it's this hot. I bet yer a Nif, ain't you?!"

There's a second when he goes to stand, but Ignis is already on his feet. A second where he goes to yell, but Ignis already has a hand clapped over his mouth and is dragging him out the door. A second where he goes to struggle, but Ignis is already hauling him up the side of the building with speed and slitting his throat out on the roof above.

"Disgusting creature," he hisses as he does it, and then kicks the body off the side with no remorse for whoever's waiting below. "You'll never touch him again, so long as I breathe. None of them.  _Ever._ "

Five men vanished over the course of a night, but only one will be found. And only because Ignis  _wants_ it - wants the world to see the words he's carved into the man's chest and stomach -  _ **BULLY.**_

In the morning, people will wonder. The bartender will be interviewed, and he will talk about the man, and then say nothing of the man in the black hoodie that sat just inches away. Because unlike the five men who vanished, the bartender knows death when he sees it - far better to keep his mouth shut on the subject.

0-0-0-0-0-0-0

 

He slips back into the hotel shortly before dawn, quietly shucking clothes into the laundry that will need doing. There are no blood stains - he's been careful - but just to make sure. 

When he slides back into bed, he can tell Prompto's awake. Has been awake, waiting for him. He takes his glasses off, leans over Prompto to put them on the nightstand.

"You killed them, didn't you."

It's not a whisper. Not a murmur. Barely a breath said in the night. But Ignis hears it, and tucks himself closer to Prompto, pressing lips to ear as he returns his answer.

"Yes."

He drops his glasses, and this time when he goes to pull back, Prompto winds hands around his shoulders, rolls over to tuck his face into Ignis' neck. Those expressive shoulders ask him a question. 

_Protect me?_

Ignis breathes him in, winds his own arms around Prompto, and says nothing of the tears - of gratitude, of fear, of understanding - bleeding through the front of his shirt. He lets his body speak for once in place of words, and he knows Prompto hears it.

_Always._


End file.
